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26 October 2013

Should the left seek strategic alliances with progressive Democrats? Does it have a choice?

In this post I will offer some reasons why I think it's necessary for progressives, socialists, and anti-capitalists to engage with the Democratic Party in the electoral and legislative arenas if we are to have any hope of putting alternatives to capitalist economy in the forefront of public consciousness.

They drink the neoliberal Kool-Aid, but maybe we could crash their party?

My use of the word "engage" is deliberately indeterminate because the manner of this engagement is something I think ought to be debated. For now, let me stress that to engage with is not the same thing as to collaborate with. I am by no means recommending the left tow the Democratic Party leadership's line or do their bidding on the ground.

These issues have been distorted, obscured, or ignored in mainstream political debate because of modern conservatism's tremendous success over roughly the last 30-45 years at pushing the public conversation and policy agenda steadily to the right.

The anti-government right's strategy of imposing arbitrary fiscal deadlines and then using them to extort major spending concessions from the Democratic leadership and their supine colleagues in the House and Senate is obviously working. With more fiscal deadlines looming, the right will no doubt attempt to secure even deeper cuts.

Since the Nixon administration, big business has collaborated through a network of think-tanks and lobbying organizations to define the public debate on economic issues in terms of a free-market, anti-government ideology. Big business has successfully implemented a policy agenda of deregulation, privatization, wage-repression and the destruction of organized labor based on this ideology through its influence within and control over the Republican Party.

This agenda was abetted by the complicity of the Democrats, of course, insofar as they remained essentially friendly to big business and under the illusion that the capitalist market economy could be effectively tamed and stabilized through enlightened fiscal and monetary policies. Nevertheless, the true architects and executors of the successful free-market offensive have overwhelmingly been allied with the Republicans, not the Democrats.

Even now, amidst talk of the breakdown of the modern GOP and proof that its most radical elements are willing to put the global economy at risk in the name of ideological purity, big business is far from being so confident that the Democratic Party will be the faithful political servant of capital that it is ready to jump ship and cut the
GOP loose.

If we can't stop austerity and the social breakdown it is precipitating, then we stand a small chance of putting alternatives to capitalism back on the public agenda. Instead, we'll be forced into a defensive fight against reactionary threats from the right that stand to gain strength in conditions of continuing social dislocation, at which point we will have already lost.

There may be many on the left who, publicly or secretly, welcome crisis as an opportunity to throw into sharp relief the deep continuities underlying both parties. Clear exposure of this fact, it is hoped, will finally lift the fog from people's eyes and lead them to the conclusion that an "authentic" alternative organized outside the corrupting influence of the electoral system is the only solution to the inevitable social contradictions created by capitalism.

But although it is tempting to see economic crisis and social breakdown as an opportunity for revolutionary transformation, a climate of crisis is rarely conducive to clear thinking and social solidarity. Crisis intensifies competition among workers and foments alienation and scapegoating, ripening the conditions for forms of mass hysteria and paranoia that are decidedly anti-social.

In order to avert the worst consequences of crisis and put socialism back on the agenda, therefore, it is first necessary to stop the onslaught of the market unleashed by the conservative offensive and create conditions in which thinking beyond the market is possible.

With organized labor the weakest it's ever been and in the absence of a viable third party with a mass base, the Democratic Party appears the only force on the left organized enough to counter the massive threat coming from the right.

The conclusion I draw from this is that there is simply no way to turn back the austerity agenda that is being dictated by the right-wing of the Republican Party and accepted by the leadership of the Democratic Party without somehow engaging the Democratic Party and forcing its leadership sharply to the left, thereby wresting power and control over the public debate from the far right and tilting the conversation back toward some kind of genuine center.

Elements of such a left-ward realignment already exist within the Democratic Party. For example, the "Back to Work Budget" proposed by the House Progressive Caucus would be practically revolutionary in our current climate of austerity. Moreover, the budget puts job creation front and center, a perfect antidote to the anti-tax nonsense demanded by the "Job Creators" and their political allies. A serious push from the left in support of such measures could have the same effect on Democrats as the Tea Party is having on Republicans.

It could even hasten the breakdown of the Democratic Party and encourage the emergence of a real third party alternative, something I know many on the anti-capitalist left have long dreamed of.

Furthermore, the logic and rhetoric of the economic policy measures proposed by House progressives can be strengthened and radicalized by the left. During the Occupy Wall Street movement, activists in New York debated adopting a "Jobs for All" demand arguably more radical in scope than the budget proposed by House progressives. An organized, grassroots movement working in support of such a demand has serious potential to resonate with the country's silent progressive majority and force the Democrats' hand.

If we are serious about wanting socialist and other non-capitalist ways of thinking to go mainstream, then we must strategically support those initiatives within the Democratic Party that have the potential of breaking down the neoliberal consensus among the leaderships of both parties. If we leave establishment Democrats unchallenged, we risk losing the whole game to the right.